Hi. A very nice description of the smart list feature. I have a
question though, let's say i want to do a party cd with various
artists from my library. I want to do it so that one artist will only
ever occurr at most twice and limit it to cd length, about one hour.
How would i make such rules? Is it at all possible?
/Krister
6 apr 2009 kl. 01.49 skrev Esther:
>
> Hi All,
>
> I'm starting a new thread about smart playlists, but this post is also
> in reply to some recent questions about how to efficiently manage
> music on devices like the new iPod Shuffle 3G and the iPod Nano 4G.
> This is a particularly useful way to select content from a large music
> library without having to constantly edit playlists by hand.
>
> Overview
>
> Smart playlists work like regular playlists, but they allow you to
> select content by using rules instead of by selecting individual
> tracks. For example, to create a playlist consisting of all tracks in
> an album, instead of adding tracks one by one to a regular playlist,
> or even by using the more efficient means of toggling on the file
> browser (Command-B), selecting an entry from the Album column, and
> using the "New Playlist from Selection" (Command-Shift-N) shortcut to
> make a regular playlist of the tracks in an album, you could make a
> smart playlist (Command-Option-N) and use a rule like: <Album> <is>
> <Name of Album> where you set the first two entries of your rule from
> pop up buttons to "Album" and "'is", and then type in the name of the
> album in a text field. This technique is most powerful when you're
> working with multiple albums, artists, etc. and/or multiple rules.
> You might have a multi-volume set where the title sometimes has the
> name of the series first, and sometimes the name of the individual
> album. Then your rule might be: <Album> <contains> and then "The
> Bootleg Series" for the text entry. This would simultaneously select
> albums like "No Direction Home: The Bootleg Series, Vol. 7" and "The
> Bootleg Series, Vol. 6: Bob Dylan Live 1964 - Concert at Philharmonic
> Hall".
> You can add a rule to exclude certain tracks. If one of the album
> tracks is a music video version that I don't want transferred to my
> iPod Shuffle, the second rule might be: <Kind> <does not contain>
> <video>, where I type the word "video" into a text field and set pop
> up buttons for the first two conditions.
>
> Smart playlist rules aren't limited to the information assigned to
> tags; you can use them to make up playlists according to your
> listening habits and preferences. If you rate your music you can apply
> rules to only include tracks above a certain star rating. You can
> assign rules according to the number of times you've listened to a
> track -- to make a favorite tracks playlist. For audiobooks you can
> play from a smart playlist and use it to keep your place in the book.
> A smart playlist with rules like <Album> <is> <Name of Album> to
> select the audiobook, and <Play count> <is> <0> can keep the latest
> unplayed track at the top of the playlist and roll off the tracks that
> you've listened to as their play count increases and they no longer
> match the rule for inclusion in the smart playlist. You can also add
> rules based on when you last listened to a track such as <Last Played>
> <is not in the last> <2> <months> to ensure a new flow of music
> listening. Most, but not all, of the iTunes view options (Command-J
> to show the menu) can be used to assign smart playlist rules. In
> addition, you can build smart playlists out of other playlists with
> rules like <Playlist> <is> <Name of Playlist>, where the named
> playlist can be either a regular or smart playlist (and can be chosen
> from a pop up menu).
>
> Two other features of smart playlists make them particularly useful
> for setting up your music on a Nano or iPod Shuffle 3G: you can limit
> the size, time length, or number of items in the smart playlist, and
> tell iTunes how you want to achieve this in case your smart playlist
> is too large, and you can use the "live updating" feature to
> dynamically control the contents of your smart playlist. The first
> feature means that you can set up a transfer playlist with a condition
> like <Limit to> <3.2> <GB> <selected by> <least recently played> and
> if the smart playlist that results from applying your rules is larger
> than 3.2 GB, it will be cut down in size by giving preference to the
> least recently played tracks. Or, you could created a workout
> playlist, that lasts exactly 40 minutes for your gym session (<Limit
> to> <40> <minutes> <selected by> <genre>), or a travel/commuting
> playlist that chooses a random sampling of podcasts that fit into your
> trip (<Limit to> <1> <hours> <selected by> <random>). The second,
> dynamical updating, feature means that your rules will continue to be
> applied on the iPod, even when you're not connected to your computer.
> If you make a smart list containing music that where it's more than 2
> months since the track was played and you have the box for live
> updating checked, playing a track on your iPod will immediately remove
> it from that playlist.
>
> Your smart playlists can be used either as a convenient way to
> transfer music to the iPod, or a way to make playlists for playing.
> With the Nano 4G, you might want to transfer music with a smart
> playlist, to keep sizes down below the maximum, but then you might
> want to navigate the menus to play songs by album or artist. With the
> iPod Shuffle 3G, you have to navigate by playlist, so you want to use
> these not just for transferring music, but also as the main way to
> play your music.
>
> There are some limitations in the way smart playlists operate. At
> present you can only set a smart playlist to either match all or your
> rules or any of your rules. So you may need to create smart playlists
> of other playlists to combine your rules (for example, all work
> composed by Wynton Marsalis in the jazz genre in either the years from
> 1985-1990 or the years from 1995-2000).
>
> Example
>
> Here's an example of constructing a smart playlist of podcasts added
> to your library in the last week that you have not finished listening
> to. The rules are:
>
> Podcast: Is True
> Date Added: Is in the last 1 week(s)
> Play Count: is: 0
>
> Start by selecting your library in iTunes' sources table (in this
> case, select "Podcasts"), then create a new smart playlist. You set up
> the rules by interacting with with the rules section of the dialog
> window for the smart playlist, and use VO-Right Arrow to create your
> rules by pressing pop up buttons and/or typing in text. At the end of
> each rule, you can either stop interacting with the rules section, add
> another rule, or delete the current rule.
>
> 1. In iTunes press Command-Option-N (shortcut keys for "New Smart
> Playlist") to bring up a smart playlist dialog window. You'll hear
> "selected by".
> 2. VO-right arrow to the "Rules Section" and interact (VO-Shift-Down
> Arrow)
> 3. VO-space on the pop up button ("Artist") and change this to
> "Podcast" by pressing "p o"
> 4. VO-right arrow to the next pop up button and leave this at the
> default "is true"
> 5. VO-right arrow to the end of rule to the "Add" button and press
> (VO-
> space)
> 6. (Second rule) VO-space on the pop up button ("Podcast") and set
> this to "Date Added" by pressing "d"
> 7. VO-right arrow to the next pop up button, VO-Space, and change this
> to "is in the last" by arrowing down
> 8. VO-right arrow to the text field and type "1"
> 9. VO-right arrow to the pop up button, VO-Space, and change this to
> "weeks"
> 10. VO-right arrow to the "Add" button and press (VO-space)
> 11. (Final rule) VO-Space on the pop up and set this to "Play count"
> 12. VO-right arrow past the "is" pop up button and leave the text
> field set to "0"
> 13. Stop interacting with the rules section
> 14. If you now VO left-arrow to the start of the dialog, the first
> line will be "Match <all> of the following rules". This is OK for us.
> It's possible to change the pop up from "all" to "any".
>
> VO-right arrow past the rules section to view the checkboxes for limit
> conditions. By default this is unchecked, and reads "Limit to" <text
> field> <items> "selected by" <random>, where "items" is a pop up
> button that can be set to minutes, hours, MB, or GB and "random" is a
> pop up button that can be set to album, artist, genre, name, most
> recently played, least recently played, highest rating, lowest rating,
> most often played, least often played, most recently added, or least
> recently added.
>
> Press "OK" and type in a name to save your smart playlist and end the
> dialog.
>
> HTH
>
> Cheers,
>
> Esther
>
>
> >
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